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Heimes adds new dimension to 'Island Memories'

I’ve long known my friend Marianne Heimes as a community leader and sometimes as a political activist.For many years, she was a voice for sound planning and neighborhood and environmental preservation in the islands area.Just this year, Heimes helped spearhead the movement that defeated – for the moment – a half-baked Chatham County plan to redo Johnny Mercer Boulevard.She also has been active in the local Republican Party and was an unsuccessful – but competitive – candidate for the county commission in 2008.Recently, though, she’s branched out into more creative ventures. The first was a fascinating 2010 book, “Island Memories.”Rather than spin her own narrative, Marianne let more than 60 long-time residents reminisce about their long lives on Wilmington, Whitemarsh, Talahi and Oatland.Their sagas go back to the 1940s, and the book is chock full of photos of the islands and islanders, many of them intimate family snapshots.Now Marianne has teamed up with former WSAV anchor Michael Jordan for a sequel that has a new dimension. It’s a video called “More Island Memories.”Like the book, it chronicles growing up on Wilmington in the 40s and 50s. There are interviews with the Lynes family, descended from the Oemlers of the Oemler Plantation and oyster factory; Joyce Fischer and Maridon; (the Oemler house and Maridon are the oldest homes on the island, both dating from early 1890s.)Both groups are interviewed on site.Another interview subject: longtime Island resident Curtis Carver.He remembers how the General Oglethorpe Hotel was the islands' playground back in the day. His narrative is accompanied by pictures of the interior of the hotel when it opened. Ray Thomas has an entertaining yarn about the “gangstas” at the Oglethorpe (Hoffa and Luciano.) There are pictures of the old hotel barber shop.Warren Matthieu describes the old sideways swinging bridges to the Islands and how long it took to open and close them.Members of the Wilmington Island Gray family are seen at lunch, looking over the old scrapbooks. Many of the pictures are shown in the film.Jordan was the producer and narrator.“More Island Memories” sells for $15 at Ace Hardware and E. Shaver, with other locations to come.” “I think it is very good,” Marianne told me. “It tells a story of the past with some lovely marsh shots. It would make an excellent stocking stuffer.”If the book’s any indication, that could be an understatement.